You Can't Take The Sky From Me
by Ice Jazz Elleth
Summary: Two men came and offered Hiro and Tadashi a place in their College for the most gifted men and women in the country. While Hiro refused, Tadashi accepted. Years later and it's now a battle for the two to stay together as one fights for his sanity and the other for his humanity. After everything that has happened, can they stay free? A fanfic inspired by the TV series, Firefly.
1. Prologue

**Aunt and Nephew Dead in Volcano Accident**

Cassandra Miller (Aged 32) and her nephew Hiro Hamada (14) were last seen at Kīlauea volcano on the 12th of November. The family had been taking a holiday in Hawaii and had gone to examine the volcano. Witnesses saw the pair examining a lava lake and apparently fall in. The reason for this is not known and scientists are examining the possibility that there were toxic fumes which lead to the demise of two. Miller was the owner of The Lucky Cat Café in the Cole Valley district of San Fransokyo and was very popular with locals for her Beat poetry night. Neighbour Frank Gwaynne (43) said "The loss of Cass [Cassandra Miller] is dreadful. Her café really brought the local community together and her kindness knew no bounds."

Hamada was adopted by his Aunt, along with his older brother Tadashi Hamada (18) when his parents died in an unfortunate car accident. At the age of 13 he had already graduated High School with top marks. His Head Mistress, Doctor Alexandra Ions stated that '…the world will sorely miss Mr Hamada. His potential to help humanity was seemingly limitless.' The elder Hamada brother was unable to be reached as he elected to attend a Boarding School for Highly Gifted Teenagers and Young Adults.

The news report was a week old. They had taken their time getting it published and for safety reasons he had to wait those excruciatingly slow seven days just to make sure he was completely out of suspicion. His fingers fiddled with the holographic projector, feeling the familiar weight of his recent invention. Its only purpose had been that exact moment but he had high hopes that future opportunities may present themselves. For now it needed to be left in his backpack.

A nervous hand, once freed from the weight of the holographic projector, went to a place just behind his ear. There was a slight bump there. It had been his only option as the Neurocraniel Transmitter had been too large and insecure to keep as something he simply wore around his head. Downsizing the tech and hiding it in his skin meant no one could remove it (with ease at least, he thought queasily).

The Korean woman – Violence Queen as Hiro had nicknamed her as she was reluctant to give him her name – crouched besides him, muscles tensed, ready for action. She cast a glance at him and frowned.

"Put the sock on already. It's nearly time you nitwit," She said, picking up the 'sock' and throwing it at him. Hiro failed to catch it and fumbled after the sock. With a tug, he pulled it over his own head. She had insisted on this extra precaution but Hiro didn't feel like it was needed and was rather unfair. Violence Queen didn't have to wear one. But he supposed that their targets already knew her identity and were searching for her. Nothing she did would change that.

He, on the other hand, was meant to be dead.

The clock chimed quarter past two in the morning. The ground stirred around them and a path shimmered towards the façade of a school wall. The wall shimmered. Hiro frowned, focusing on getting the micro-camera working. He'd set it up to feed on to his mobile; the news article vanished to be replaced by a screen split into four, each showing different videos from the micro-cameras. He would now watch the progress of his microbots which was kinda necessary as he couldn't see where they were any more. Moving silently through the school they went straight into the security cameras and uploaded their little bug.

Soon all the cameras were only showing looped footage and Hiro withdrew the microbots so he and Violence Queen could use them to get over the wall.

"You ready?" He asked her. She punched him in the arm and he stumbled from the force.

"I'll take that as a yes," He said, forming a bicycle from the tiny robots. Getting the design down so they were actually micro size had been more than a pain. He was proud of the result.

"I'll signal when they're down," She promised, hopping onto the bike and cycling off. Her job was to knock out the guards with a set of tranquilizers that Hiro had managed to acquire through less than legal means. But it was safe. He had tested it on the dealer.

A few minutes of thinking and his mobile showed him that the Korean woman was looking at the front where one of his camerabots was. This was the signal and he hurried into the building itself. The place was weird. The rooms he ran past looked like class rooms. Some still had lessons on the black boards – Hiro thought they must be basic classes from what he saw. He stepped over a guard and went down the stairs, noting the marks where Violence Queen must have gone down with some speed.

The search for Tadashi began. Hiro would cover the lower levels, Violence Queen the upper. That's where she had been kept but she suspected that they would have changed things after her escape. Hiro hurried down another flight of stairs. The first few rooms were worrying. Seats with straps to hold their victims in place. Something to go over the head. Clearly there was some form of surgery going on around that area. But he could see nothing to explain what it was that they were doing. There hadn't been anything on the internet.

The seventh room had men in it. Two of them. They sat bolt upright on hearing the door open and for a second their eyes locked. Hiro fumbled around for the few syringes of the tranquilisers. Then there was a sharp pain that penetrated his skull. Something wet travelled down from his eyes, ears and nose. All he could do was picture his microbots attacking the men and breaking their necks to stop this thing scrapping his brain with rusty nails.

CRACK!

Relief filled him as the pain went away. With his sleeve, Hiro wiped away the wetness from his eyes and stumbled forwards. His bots lay limply around the form of the two men, their heads at odd angles. A strange stick was in their blue gloved hands. His own snakingly took this and be tore it apart, unwilling to let such power get into other hands. A quick search gave him a journal and he took this, hopeful it might have more information.

He had to step around the corpses to escape.

Why hadn't he even tried to get out of it without killing? His eyes looked at his sleeve where he could feel the dampness seeping through against his skin. It was a black sleeve and showed no colour so he rolled it back. There was traces of red on his skin.

He doubted Tadashi would accept that as a valid reason to have become a murderer.

Best kept as a secret then.

Hiro ran on, pushing open doors, eyes constantly on the looking for his brother.

"Hiro, I found him," He barely heard Violence Queen's voice on the mobile and he skidded to a halt. Speeding back along the way he came, he followed the open doors until he found what this was all about. Tadashi was in what could only be described as clothes for someone about to go under the knife. His face looked blank and at rest but somehow the young adult seemed older and definitely gaunter.

"Have you…?"

"Sedated him. Yes. And the others?"

"Others?" His voice raised an octave.

"Just two. We're not leaving them."

"We only came for Tadashi!"

"Yeah, well, you don't know what these people put us through. We're not leaving anyone to go through that,"

"I don't care about them!"

"Would Tadashi?"

That stung. It stung a lot. Because Tadashi would. For some reason his brother cared about everyone.

"Fine. We'll take them as well." He said, looking at the two sleeping figures. A tall, skinny, blonde-brown haired woman and a big black guy. The microbots grabbed all five of them and they were quickly carried out of the base and away from the city.


	2. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1**

Hiro shuddered. It had taken one night to make a murderer out of him. He had murdered to save his brother; the sleeping form at his feet that looked so innocent, so much like Tadashi which might not even be him. Or at least not all him.

The sky above him was pitch black and he could see the stars. Light that had been emitted eons ago in some cases and only just now were reaching his eyes. For a second he felt utterly insignificant until a small voice in the back of his read reminded him that he was a genius who had organised a prison break which saved his brother's life. On the horizon, he could make out the glowing light from San Fransokyo.

Just then a yawn escaped from the boy. He was exhausted having controlled the microbots to bring them all the way out here. They must have been travelling for hours on end, although the sun had not yet risen. Brown eyes travelled down to his brother and he leaned towards Tadashi, taking in the slumbering figure.

"Don't wake him," Hiro looked up at the short woman. Her eyes gleamed in the low light which brought her purple streak out well. Crouched as she was, she looked befitting of her title of Violence Queen.

"I wasn't going to," Hiro said, looking down at his brother. To think that they had both come so close to being trapped there… He looked away.

"You should get cleaned up," The woman suggested, gesturing to his face. Hiro's hand rose to his nose, then eyes and ears, feeling the dried blood. Man, whatever that tech had been, it seriously hurt. He wondered whether they had ever used that on Tadashi. Probably not. From what he felt of the device, it's purpose was to kill. It was lucky that he had killed the men quickly before they got to him. The two blue gloved monsters that ran the supposed 'college'.

The microbots moved to the stream that they had stopped by. Hiro had perfected the design so the robots were able to make a water tight container using their new microscopic design. A dish came back to him, full to the brim and the boy quickly washed his face, rubbing out the dried blood, unable to see how the water turned a rusty colour. He made sure to wash his face away from Tadashi so as not to spill any water on his brother. Violence Queen was adamant that they avoid waking any of the sleepers who had been drugged before removal. Now they were just in a natural sleep. Hiro was exhausted.

"I can take the first watch," Violence Queen (or rather Mi-Cha, which was her actual name) suggested, aware of how tired the boy was. She was never sure how she could do that. But after the few weeks she had been subjected to those horrible tortures, she had been able to sense what state people were in. Happy, sad, hungry, full, calm, angry, hyper, tired. And the kid was dreadfully tired, it was amazing he hadn't fallen over onto the pebbles that made up the ground. The only thing keeping him going was his concern for his big brother. Mi-Cha didn't know how long that would last. She had seen what happened to people who were there too long. The only reason she had helped out was to get back at those men.

"Thanks," The child said, using his swarming robots (microbots he had called them) to lift himself onto the grass where the others slept. He pressed a finger to a spot just above his ear and the microbots dispersed, vanished into thin air. He used something implanted into his skull to control the robots Mi-Cha knew and because of this he needed a way to make sure he could turn them off for the night. Here was one seriously messed up kid. As far as she was concerned, it was a good thing he had denied the offer to study with those creeps. The kid had told her the story about how he was nearly recruited. With his mind and ability to walk a razer's edge, she hated to think what they could do with someone like him. And so young and malleable.

"Night, kid," She muttered, aware that he was already lightly snoring, worry lines all gone from his features.

Hiro was never good at dreaming. Someone as logical and as clever as he was should have been able to tell when he was in a dream. That was never the case. At first he dreamed that he and Tadashi were talking in a field, chatting about Hiro's microbots and Tadashi's plans for a health care robot that he had never had the chance to make. Hiro had almost forgotten about the planned Baymax until now. They were laughing and Tadashi was ruffling his hair, the old insult, 'knuckle head' being forced upon him once more. At the edge of the field, he saw Aunt Cass, standing and holding Mochi. Hiro took Tadashi's hand and started to lead him towards the couple. But he was stopped. Suddenly he was restrained. Around his legs, his abdomen, chest and head.

Struggle as he might, he couldn't get out. Where had Tadashi gone? Where was Aunt Cass and Mochi? His breath came in rapid pants although he didn't feel out of breath at all. Then came two men, blue gloves hugging their hands and the teenager felt like a knife had been plunged into him. They spoke but he couldn't understand what they were saying. Then one drew out the stick and pain filled him. He screamed. The scene changed and he was falling into a volcano, still screaming but it was not his voice.

No. It was Tadashi's.

Hiro sat bolt upright and felt tears start to spring out of his eyes unbidden. The memory of being happy with Tadashi and then the nightmarish scene were too fresh in his mind for him to realise the screams were actually happening.

Then he was aware he was being roughly shaken.

"Woman up, whatever you just dreamed is nothing compared to what'll happen to us if we're found. Snap out of it," Violence Queen hit him. Hiro blinked, rubbing the tears out of his eyes. A hand flung to his ear, reactivating the microbots. Immediately they formed something that looked like a large bolder, the five of them inside. The walls started to glow until it was light; an extra feature Hiro had installed while the microbots should muffle the sound considerably.

And in the electronic light, Hiro saw that his brother, along with the two others had panicked and even now were scrambling for a corner where they could hide. Hiro dimmed the lights, wondering if this would help.

Slowly, he moved forwards, inching closer towards them. He had no idea what to do with the other two and had only saved them because Tadashi would. In reality Hiro didn't care for other people so his main focus was on his brother.

"Ta…dashi?" He said slowly, once their wild panicking had calmed down so there were no longer any screaming.

"Hiro?" Came an uncertain voice. At this distance, Hiro crouched and stretched out so his hand could touch Tadashi's. Immediately his brother grabbed him. Tight.

"Not safe! They're here! They talk to us! In my head-" Hiro inched forwards so he wasn't stretched. His heart was running a marathon and he wished he had stayed in his nightmare.

"Tadashi, it's me, Hiro, you're brother. You're safe now. Nothing can hurt you," He muttered. There, that sounded comforting and it was truthful, for the most part.

"Safe?" Hiro turned to look at the feminine voice who had spoken. She stared at him with child-like eyes behind large glasses that lay crooked on her face.

"Seguro? Never safe. They find us. Four days by the dead tree. Never safe. No Seguro," She muttered while Tadashi seemed intent on staring at Hiro's face and reaching out with a nervous hand to touch it. _What should I do?_ Hiro wondered desperately. Tadashi always looked after him, always cared for him and failing that, Aunt Cass. He was just some kid.

A kid who's killed.

Hiro hated the small voice in the back of his head. Some time to grow a conscious.

Thankfully Tadashi then engulfed Hiro in a hug which prevented him from having to do much more than hug his brother back in a fashion that was probably too tight for someone who had just escaped what seemed to be a torture facility.

"Not that you care, but I'm getting some sleep," Violence Queen said. Hiro didn't pull out of the hug to look at the Korean.

"I thought they'd made you go away," Tadashi muttered. Hiro could feel a wet patch forming on his shoulder. "They made happiness go and then you'd be gone too,"

"I'm right here, buddy. I'll never leave again," Hiro whispered.

"Never?"

"Hey, what kind of a brother would that make me?" He tried to sound cheerful for Tadashi. He really did.

"Are we really safe?" Asked the big guy that they had rescued. Hiro opened his eyes and looked over Tadashi's shoulder.

"I'll keep us safe," Hiro promised, looking at the walls that he had built around them. He had memorised all the details about satellites so he knew where would be safe from their prying eyes and for how long. There had been plenty of research but now Tadashi should be free from their hold. Besides, Violence Queen had managed fairly well by herself. They'd survive. And once Hiro had hacked into a few more governments he'd find out which countries would be safe to hide in. As far as he was concerned, they all might be doing such experiments.

"So just, you know, try get some sleep," He suggested, the pressure of three pairs of eyes on him being a bit too much for Hiro to handle. For a second, Tadashi held his gaze before pulling himself into a tight ball and looking for all the world asleep. The others followed suit.

What exactly had they done? Hiro brought out the note book he had stolen. It was in some sort of code, he quickly realised as his brown eyes scanned over the handwritten work, flicking through pages. There was enough data in here that he should be able to crack the code but it didn't look like it was going to be easy. Hm. He supposed 'e' would be the most commonly used so he could find out what represented e. Then 'a' or 'I' were the only single letters so at the end of it, he should at least be able to get some vowls possible figured out. He needed a pencil so he could start transcribing the documents.

Fingers moved through the bag he had, packed to the brim with things he might need. Provisions that should last them a week at best. And a huge wad of cash that came from bot fighting. His microbots won the day. It was too easy but he needed the money for all of this and there was no way he would resort to stealing, Tadashi would not be impressed. Brown eyes shot up as Tadashi twitched but nothing else happened. Sadly, he wondered if it were possible for anyone here to have good dreams ever again. Tiredly, Hiro rubbed his eyes and thought about how long they would be safe this close to San Fransokyo. They hadn't travelled far and this stop had simply been because he could no longer carry them any further on the microbots. If they went up stream, they should be able to move with relative freedom and didn't have to worry about any hikers. But it would take them away from any civilisation that they needed.

So follow the nearby river? Hiro stared at a map he had brought with him. Yep, nothing upstream but he could reach another city within a few days if they used the much larger river. Which left them more vulnerable.

Perhaps the best option was to fly out. Hiro picked up his mobile and quickly surfed the net. He couldn't risk hacking on this in case they traced him but keeping an eye on the local news was good. He looked through the feed for anything relevant, skipping over his own faked death. Nothing on breaking Tadashi out. That was a mixed blessing he felt. And also nothing about a dangerous criminal which he could be labelled as if they wanted to avoid mentioning that school. But it was just early days. He may get reported tomorrow. Even if they had no footage or living survivors who had seen him.

Hiro had been little more than a ghost.

With a heavy heart, the young teen went out of the microbotic home. The Violence Queen muttered something about turning down the brightness so he obliged. The air was cool and Hiro realised that the microbots would be of a lot of use when winter hit. In the brightness of the day he couldn't see any sign of the city that had once been his home. He must have been really tired to have been able to sleep through this light. The proof in it was the fact that he was still yawning, Hiro supposed.

In all fairness, he could probably catch a few more hours. Inside the microbotic shell they should be safe. But now that he had managed to catch some rest, thoughts buzzed through his brain. He should have planned further in advance. The microbots would need recharging after a couple of months if they relied as heavily on them as he predicted. True he could just pick it up from the electricity wires but it meant he would need to factor in journeys to get to such places. And the food. For himself he could ration. But he wasn't sure about everyone else. Money would last a while of course but he would need to bot fight again. Especially if he wanted to fly out of the country.

For the first time since finding out about his brother's predicament, Hiro let himself cry. This was a job for adults to worry about. Not a fourteen year old kid that hadn't even hit puberty. Now he was alone. Tadashi was in no state to help him and he didn't trust any of the others. In a shaky breath he let out a few choice curses which would have had Tadashi holding out the swear jar. For once, the words offered no solace. It was dreadful. Was this what grownups felt like? Had he overused them and not for their intended purpose? Had that taken away their proven power to remove pain and other negative sensations?

His legs gave way, either from the panic and fear that had locked onto his body or the fact that the exhaustion of recent events had come back to him. He welcomed the sharp pain of the pebbles as his skin and bone clashed against the rock. A sudden sharpness that faded into a dull sensation. If only all his problems could fade.

"Hiro?"

How long had he been lying there? He didn't respond.

Hands pulled him gently up into a sitting position, one arm supporting his back. Hiro looked into the face of Tadashi. Brown eyes flickered to the microbots. He had left an opening when he went out. That was a mistake which he'd need to not make again.

"We can do this," Tadashi told him, a blank smile on his face. "You're not alone,"

"What?" Hiro said, blinking.

"You think you are alone. You're not. You saved us. I'm proud of you,"

"Thanks, buddy," The conversation felt odd and heavy. They both knew that Tadashi had been damaged leaving their relationship new and unexplored.

The two brothers sat in silence for a bit, Tadashi holding Hiro, his body shaking slightly.

"It's good," Tadashi finally said.

"What is?"

"The sun. Energy transferred is equal to the mass of an object multiplied by the specific heat capacity and the change in temperature. Average specific heat capacity of human is 3470 J/kg°C. My mass is 75.8 kg. Heat change is-"

"Er, Tadashi?"

"Hiro?"

"No need to figure out the energy transference. Not exactly that important right now,"

"Oh."

"How do you even know the average specific heat capacity of a person?"

"Looked it up."

"When?"

"Long ago. I think."

"Remembering it for water would have been more helpful."

"4181, I know,"

Hiro decided that he may need to start learning more specific heat capacities. There was no way Tadashi was going to beat him.

"Come on," Hiro said, starting to stand. "You should go back into the microbots and get some more sleep."

"Not tired,"

"You've been stuck in that place for weeks on end. You deserve more of a rest."

He didn't want to be pushing Tadashi away but things just didn't feel right. Tadashi frowned.

"Stay and sleep too?" He suggested.

"I can't. I'm taking the second watch," Hiro tried to be patient.

"Safe. For now. She said four. We can sleep!"

"No, I need to keep a look out, make sure no one walks along here and sees us,"

"No voices near. Quiet. Three more then we watch. Trust her. Never wrong."

"Right… Well, you keep telling yourself that while you get some sleep,"

"Not tired. You are. I slept more."

"You're offering to take the watch?" It seemed ludicrous that someone in Tadashi's state might be up for such a task.

"You don't think I can do it,"

"You've just escaped, Tadashi!"

"You carried us here,"

"Yes. I got us into this. So it's my duty to stay and watch."

"I'll watch with you then," A small smile crept onto Tadashi's face. "Knucklehead,"

 **Author Note: Gogo Tomago in the Comics is called Reiko which a search tells me means beautiful child. As in the movie, she is Korean, I have chosen to use a name which means beautiful girl in Korean so as to keep close to both materials.**

 **I have also chosen to call her Violence Queen, a name that Hiro has given her in the Manga as Fred has yet to go around and bestow names on people.**


End file.
